What is the most impressive major to adcoms ?

[FreakyFreak]

In my opinion med schools do rank the difficulty of major as a pretty important factor. I am also pretty sure that engineering is the most desireable med school major followed by biochem. Biology is one of the most useful majors for med school but ranked very lowly on their list.

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[kash_711]

In my opinion med schools do rank the difficulty of major as a pretty important factor. I am also pretty sure that engineering is the most desireable med school major followed by biochem. Biology is one of the most useful majors for med school but ranked very lowly on their list.

where did you pull this list out of?

 

[tank you]

where did you pull this list out of?

i think we all know which orifice it was extracted from

 

[jrllusom2008]

where did you pull this list out of?

I was an Anthropology major...best choice I ever made and I still got admitted. Do what you want for undergrad. The most important thing is GPA anyway, and if you're taking classes in something you like you'll do well in them. Also, it gave me something interesting to talk about in my interviews. Most people are at least somewhat interested in archaeology, and I love the stuff so it worked out well. Learn what you want. You'll be learning about science for the next 40 years.

 

[virilep]

yeah i def agree with loma linda kid... i was a biomed engineer major.... but there is a statistic i read somewhere that said history majors have the highest acceptance rate. i dunno where i got that from, but look for it. but definately do what you love cuz it'll give u interest which leads to good GPA

 

[Fermata]

Underwater basketweaving.

 

[Docgeorge]

Underwater basketweaving.

Amen to that!

Although if I could do undergrad again I'd do cultural anthro. Did'nt find that one till the end of junior year.

 

[jammin06]

yeah i def agree with loma linda kid... i was a biomed engineer major.... but there is a statistic i read somewhere that said history majors have the highest acceptance rate. i dunno where i got that from, but look for it. but definately do what you love cuz it'll give u interest which leads to good GPA

I think music majors had the highest acceptance rate...somethign crazy like 70%.....hrm, maybe i could go on a kazoo scholarship..

 

[Code Brown]

In my opinion med schools do rank the difficulty of major as a pretty important factor. I am also pretty sure that engineering is the most desireable med school major followed by biochem. Biology is one of the most useful majors for med school but ranked very lowly on their list.

Major in something relatively unique to make you stand. Seriously, a third of your classes will probably be your General Ed reqs, another third will be your Pre-Med reqs, which really means your major consumes only about a third of your total undergrad work. Therefore, all the students are pretty much on par with each other. People who bitch about taking hard majors and about the fact that they are more deserving are often just bitter for taking something they don't really enjoy. Take a look at the stats for each school and you'll see that the majority of schools take between 20-30% of their students from non-science backgrounds.

 

[constructor]

I think music majors had the highest acceptance rate...somethign crazy like 70%.....hrm, maybe i could go on a kazoo scholarship..

people immediately think there's something about music majors that makes them intelligent or more prepared for medical school. the real reason they do well is that they don't have to worry about a thousand things like we do, so they can just focus on the science classes and the mcat and devote much more time to them than most of us.

 

[hardy]

I think music majors had the highest acceptance rate...somethign crazy like 70%.....hrm, maybe i could go on a kazoo scholarship..

I thought it was math majors? That's at least what the AMCAS stats says.

 

[jwtaylor]

i remembering reading that engineering majors fared alot better than any other major and that biochem/bio majors had the lowest acceptance rates...which kinda surprised me but didnt at the same time....i think the percentage attached to the engineering thing was 70%...but i dont know how useful that will be because i cant think of what context it was used in.

 

[riverie]

isn't it possible that out of the sheer number of biology majors who apply, the acceptance rate out of that pool would be smaller than say the acceptance rate of 10 music majors who apply?

 

[Dr Turninkoff]

isn't it possible that out of the sheer number of biology majors who apply, the acceptance rate out of that pool would be smaller than say the acceptance rate of 10 music majors who apply?

i don't think it's a result of sample size because realistically there are probably quite a few music majors that apply, numerically speaking.

 

[beriberi]

In the world of non-science majors, there are very few people who have completed the things necessary for application to medical school (pre-reqs, MCAT, etc). Many science majors complete the pre-reqs through their general coursework and have little additional work to do to apply to medical school.

Therefore, anyone applying to medical school who is not a science major who is applying to medical school is in a self-selected class who have planned their undergraduate experience carefully and prepped for med school for many years. This certainly is true of some bio, chem, etc. people, but by no means all. This is partially true of some engineers.

The percentages are silly to look at and tell you very little about how you will come across as an applicant.

berberi, MD.
Great liberal art school, BA '00 Studio Art major.
Top 5 medical school, MD '04.

 

[adamj61]

I agree with beriberi...I also think we can agree biochem/bact/genetics is looked upon better than simple biology.

 

[tae1703]

people immediately think there's something about music majors that makes them intelligent or more prepared for medical school. the real reason they do well is that they don't have to worry about a thousand things like we do, so they can just focus on the science classes and the mcat and devote much more time to them than most of us.

amen to that my roommate is a music major and he does absolutely nothing. he doesnt study, he's taking like 8th grade math, and he just has fun all day long. and still he does well in his classes. i asked him about studying and he said he doesnt have to bc he knows most of the things about his major anyway. all music classes are worth only 1 credit hour. id kill myself from boredom with a major like that

 

[mercaptovizadeh]

amen to that my roommate is a music major and he does absolutely nothing. he doesnt study, he's taking like 8th grade math, and he just has fun all day long. and still he does well in his classes. i asked him about studying and he said he doesnt have to bc he knows most of the things about his major anyway. all music classes are worth only 1 credit hour. id kill myself from boredom with a major like that

Music is a lovely subject, theory, composition, and performance.

However, it shouldn't be recognized as equal to math or physics in terms of applicability and training for medicine.

Unfortunately, the med schools are more interested in GPA than school or major.

 

[amena]

wait...now you guys have me thinking, should i change my major?!

It's true , there are so many bio majors out there ..and most end up as bio majors because they feel it'll fulfill all their medical school obligations to the hilt with the pre-reqs and the advanced classes as an add-on, but then again its never is as satisfying as say...actually picking something you like! duh..i know, but this has seriousely been bothering me for the longest time. I switched from being a Physician Assistant major (1 yr) to Biology b/c everyone in school who was a "premed" was there doing biology as well...now my grades are lower because of the pressure and im feeling unhappy with it as a whole. I know the logical solution would be to switch, my choice would be English which i love, but ive taken so many bio classes, am a sophmore, and now wondering if it would even be realistic to switch at this so late in time ? Should i? I dunno just asking your opinions guys- help!

 

[Fermata]

people immediately think there's something about music majors that makes them intelligent or more prepared for medical school. the real reason they do well is that they don't have to worry about a thousand things like we do, so they can just focus on the science classes and the mcat and devote much more time to them than most of us.

I don't think so.

I just think that the average music major applying for med school is more likely to know the process/is more intelligent than the average bio major(Read: 99% of bio majors are premed - even the dumb ones with bad grades).

Then again, what do I know.

 

[PostalWookie]

Seriously, major doesn't matter. You can be an astrophysics-BME-music triple major and get trounced by a bio major with better stats. Pick something you like and think you can do well in. If you pick a major based on what a medical school would like, get ready for a miserable 4 years.

 

[Avenue Q]

Underwater basketweaving.

Okay. THis might make me sound like a total dork for asking, but is this a quote from somewhere or something? When I was a kid at camp the counselors used it for a codeword and i always thought it was just their inside joke. Is there something I have been missing all along? Is this something everyone knows and usese?

Ok, looser moment over.

 

[doogyhowser]

isn't it possible that out of the sheer number of biology majors who apply, the acceptance rate out of that pool would be smaller than say the acceptance rate of 10 music majors who apply?

on a different note, why didn't you apply to Brown?

yeah, i checked out your stats. Doesn't Brown accept the majority of their students from their own undergrad?

carry on

 

[deuist]

The two majors with highest acceptance rates (as of the year 2000) are:
1. philosophy
2. physics

Note: I'm not saying that adcoms favor these majors. I think that few people with philosophy or physics degrees are applying to med school, thereby forcing statistics in their favor.

 

[liverotcod]

Okay. THis might make me sound like a total dork for asking, but is this a quote from somewhere or something? When I was a kid at camp the counselors used it for a codeword and i always thought it was just their inside joke. Is there something I have been missing all along? Is this something everyone knows and usese?

Ok, looser moment over.

Underwater Basketweaving has been a code for "easy class" since at least the early 80s.

 

[riverie]

i don't think it's a result of sample size because realistically there are probably quite a few music majors that apply, numerically speaking.

well, i didn't mean to say that there were only 10 music major applicants. my point was that comparatively, the proportion of music majors to biology majors is probably 1 in 100. Thus out of say 10 000 biology majors applying, you will have arguably a greater spread of applicant quality than in 100 music majors. So the acceptance rate from a 100 music majors may seem higher than among the 10 000 bio majors.

Feel free to argue this with me if you think my logic is flawed. Stats wasn't exactly my favorite subject in school.

 

[riverie]

on a different note, why didn't you apply to Brown?

yeah, i checked out your stats. Doesn't Brown accept the majority of their students from their own undergrad?

carry on

lol. this seems to be a major misconception about Brown Med. I answered a similar question in the following thread:

http://forums.studentdoctor.net/showthread.php?p=2048890#post2048890

the point is, if you're a brown premed and not in the PLME program, your chances of getting into the med school are arguably less than an outside applicant's. The PLMEs were already accepted 4 years ago and what places are left are the ones up for grabs right now. The whole point of Brown Med's opening up to outside applicants was to get diversity of undergrad colleges in the class, so accepting more Brown premeds isn't going to add to the diversity of a class already full of PLMEs! Plus they only reserve 3 or 4 places for non-PLME Brown kids like me, so I decided that it was NOT worth applying!

plus, i didn't want to live in Providence for another 4 years!

 

[Vacant]

The two majors with highest acceptance rates (as of the year 2000) are:
1. philosophy
2. physics

Note: I'm not saying that adcoms favor these majors. I think that few people with philosophy or physics degrees are applying to med school, thereby forcing statistics in their favor.

That's what my advisor claimed when I began the premed program (he half jokingly and half truthfully said "If the adcom see that you are a philosophy major, they would not look further but put you into acceptance file.), and that's what I found as I come to the near conclusion of this application process.

I'm a philosophy major and so far doing great.

Now don't argue with me that philosophy is easier than any sciences. After several years of reading the most complex and dense materials, subjects like bio, physics, chem, orgo, or calculus were all too straightforward and simple. If you are not convinced, try reading through just a chapter of Heidegger or Kant and back to your physics text. You will be very happy to be solving physics problems.

 

[pakidoc]

In my opinion med schools do rank the difficulty of major as a pretty important factor. I am also pretty sure that engineering is the most desireable med school major followed by biochem. Biology is one of the most useful majors for med school but ranked very lowly on their list.

i agree with you...
engineering without doubt is the hardest undergraduate major.

 

[AxlxA]

I really believe that non-bio majors who apply are the ones who are really ready and want to do medicine. I also hear humanities major has an easier time with the verbal section of MCAT. Another thing, i generally believe humanities major has are better applicants because adcomm probably believe they aren't just dicking around when they're applying. those applicants are probably not influenced in anyway by their parents like the majority of us out there.

Of course alot of us would deny that we're applying because of our families but for me, adcomm might want to see more unique individuals like those seen in music, philo, poly sci, etc

<end ranting>

 

[MWillie]

I really believe that non-bio majors who apply are the ones who are really ready and want to do medicine.

Well I don't.

 

[Acherona]

Don't philosophers have the highest IQ's? Followed by physicists? Maybe they are just smarter and have better stats.

I think it must be a *little* more impressive to adcoms to be a non-science major just because you have shown you can excel in science without spending nearly as much time studying it. I mean if you are a bio major and do badly on the Biosci MCAT section, that's kind of sad. Also, a non-bio major shows you've considered other fields and arent' just going into medicine because it's the only thing you've been exposed to.

Chem majors must do pretty well too since the MCAT is like half chemistry.

Well I don't.

 

[MWillie]

Don't philosophers have the highest IQ's? Followed by physicists? Maybe they are just smarter and have better stats.

I think it must be a *little* more impressive to adcoms to be a non-science major just because you have shown you can excel in science without spending nearly as much time studying it. I mean if you are a bio major and do badly on the Biosci MCAT section, that's kind of sad. Also, a non-bio major shows you've considered other fields and arent' just going into medicine because it's the only thing you've been exposed to.

Chem majors must do pretty well too since the MCAT is like half chemistry.

You guys are making some sweeping generalizations, a thing I try to avoid.

 

[Acherona]

making sweeping generalizations is one of my favorite pastimes when I'm not neurotically checking email for inverview invites.

You guys are making some sweeping generalizations, a thing I try to avoid.